[momentarily]

No, Eich's $1000 didn't singlehandedly determine a law. It's peanuts. It's nothing. On the other hand, this witch hunt did singlehandedly disenfranchise him of hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of employment.

There is no comparison.

[dnr]

The pro-prop-8 side spent $39M. The passage of the amendment caused the state to stop recognizing 18,000 previously-legitimate marriages. So if you count only immediate effects, his $1000 contribution works out to 0.46 marriages, or destroying the marriage of about one person. Is the emotional harm done to that person worth hundreds of thousands of dollars? It's at least comparable.

In fact I think the harm done to Californians and other Americans by the passage of prop 8 is vastly more than is implied by that simple calculation. I'll just link to my other comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7525692

[momentarily]

What's the sound of one person getting married?

[dnr]

Do you believe that you're making a good-faith attempt to understand how prop 8 caused actual harm to people, and how Eich bears some responsibility for that harm?

For this purpose you don't even have to accept that it was a net negative; you could even believe that prop 8 was overall positive for society. Just that it also caused some harm to some people, and that Eich suffering harm as well is not some crazy unjustified notion, but can be talked about in the same way.

[eevee]

"I do"?

[eevee]

The inventor of JavaScript will have to find something else to do. Woe unto him.

It's not a witch hunt if we really did catch him red-handed using his magical powers for evil.

[momentarily]

It is a witch hunt. He didn't do anything illegal.

Your moral judgment concerns no one but you. It is binding on no one but you.

You are a bigot. Everyone that is complicit in disenfranchising this man of employment because of his political opinions is a bigot.

Political persecution doesn't just happen in the third world. It also happens here. And it's a crime against humanity wherever it happens.

You are responsible for what you did. I am holding you responsible for your actions. I am holding you responsible for what you did to this man.

[eevee]

I didn't do anything illegal, either. Yet you seem to have some unspoken set of rules beyond mere law that govern what is acceptable behavior. I've got some of those, too.

I don't want him to not have a job. I want him to not have this job.

I'm curious why it's okay for him to pay money in an attempt to enforce his opinions on others via law, but I'm a bigot and a pox upon civilization for talking on Twitter.